What Mark 13:32 Is Really Telling Us
One of the most discussed verses about the identity of Christ — and why it points
toward the miracle of the Incarnation, not away from it.
“But concerning that day or that hour, no one knows, not even the angels
in heaven, nor the Son, but only the Father.”
Mark 13:32 · ESV
The Verse That Stops People in Their Tracks
You can understand why this verse catches people off guard. Here is Jesus — the one the Gospels
call Lord, the one Thomas addresses as “My God” — openly admitting He does not know
something. The day of His own return. An event that sits at the very center of Christian hope.
For critics of orthodox Christianity, this looks like a clean knockout: if Jesus does not know this, He
cannot be God. Case closed.
But that conclusion moves too fast. It assumes that knowing everything, all the time, in every mode
of existence, is the only way divinity works. The Bible tells a far more layered story — and once
you see it, Mark 13:32 stops being a problem and becomes one of the most striking windows into
what the Incarnation actually cost.
Let’s slow down and look carefully at what Scripture actually teaches.The Doctrine That Changes Everything: The Hypostatic
Union
Before we can interpret a single verse about Jesus correctly, we need a foundation. The Bible
teaches, repeatedly and from multiple angles, that Jesus Christ has two complete natures — one
fully divine, one fully human — united in one person.
This doctrine is called the hypostatic union, from the Greek word hypostasis meaning “substance”
or “underlying reality.” It was formally articulated at the Council of Chalcedon in 451 AD, but it
wasn’t invented there — it was drawn directly from the New Testament.
JOHN 1:1
“In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was
with God, and the Word was God.”
COLOSSIANS 2:9
“For in him the whole fullness of deity dwells
bodily.”
HEBREWS 1:3
“He is the radiance of the glory of God and the
exact imprint of his nature.”
JOHN 1:14
“The Word became flesh and dwelt among us, and
we have seen his glory.”
John 1:14 — “The Word became flesh and dwelt among us, and we have seen his glory.”
Notice the language. Not “partly divine.” Not “divine in a limited sense.” The whole fullness of deity, dwelling bodily. The exact imprint of God’s nature. This is not the vocabulary of a lesser being.
And yet — the Word became flesh. He didn’t merely put on a human costume. He genuinely took on human nature: its limitations, its vulnerabilities, its felt experience of time and tiredness and need. Both are true. Fully God. Fully man. At the same time.
Hold that tension carefully as we go deeper.
The key to unlocking Mark 13:32 is a concept theologians call the kenosis, from the Greek word in Philippians 2 that is usually translated “emptied.” Paul writes:
“Though he was in the form of God, did not count equality with God a thing to be grasped, but emptied himself, by taking the form of a servant, being born in the likeness of men. And being found in human form, he humbled himself by becoming obedient to the point of death, even death on a cross.”
Philippians 2:6–8 · ESV
This passage has been debated for centuries, but its core message is clear: the Son of God voluntarily accepted a radical downward move. He who existed in the very form of God — sharing fully in divine glory and prerogatives — took on the form of a servant.
What the “Emptying” Does and Does Not Mean
It does NOT mean Jesus gave up His divine nature or ceased to be God. That would contradict Colossians 2:9 and the rest of Scripture. God cannot cease to be God.
It DOES mean Jesus voluntarily accepted the genuine limitations of human existence — choosing to live within them, in real dependence on the Father and the Spirit, rather than constantly drawing on the full exercise of His divine attributes.
Think of it this way. A surgeon who is also a concert pianist might, during a long operation, choose never to use her musical gifts. She is still a pianist — every bit of that ability remains — but the context and her voluntary choice constrain its expression. The analogy breaks down at several points (Jesus was far more constrained, and the stakes were infinitely higher), but it gestures at the idea: limitation does not equal loss of identity or nature.
The Son of God chose to live as a genuine human being. That meant He chose to inhabit what genuine human life actually is — including its genuine not-knowing.
The Evidence in Plain Sight: Jesus’ Real Human Experience
The Gospels are remarkably candid about the physical and experiential realities of Jesus’ human life. These aren’t embarrassing admissions the authors try to explain away. They’re recorded matter-of-factly, as straightforward descriptions of what being truly human looked like in the Son of God.
• He grew tired and sat down by a well — exhausted from the journey (John 4:6)
• He became hungry after forty days of fasting in the desert (Matthew 4:2)
• He fell asleep in a boat during a violent storm at sea (Mark 4:38)
• He wept at the grave of Lazarus — genuine grief, real tears (John 11:35)
• He grew in wisdom and stature as a child and young man (Luke 2:52)
• He felt the full weight of approaching death in Gethsemane (Luke 22:44)
Luke 2:52 is especially striking. The eternal Son of God, who spoke the universe into existence, grew in wisdom. He learned. He developed. He experienced what it is to have a mind that acquires knowledge over time, through experience — just as every human child does.
If Jesus could genuinely grow in wisdom, if He could genuinely experience hunger and exhaustion and grief, then there is nothing incoherent about Him genuinely not knowing, in His human experience, the timing of the final day. It fits exactly the pattern the Gospels establish everywhere else.
But Wait — Doesn’t Jesus Know Everything?
At this point a fair question arises: if Jesus didn’t know the day or hour, how do we explain all the places where He clearly does know things He shouldn’t naturally be able to know? The Gospels don’t hide these moments. They’re everywhere.
Human Limitation:
• Does not know the day or hour (Mark 13:32)
• Grows in wisdom over time (Luke 2:52)
• Asks “Who touched me?” in a crowd (Mark 5:30)
• Learns obedience through suffering (Hebrews 5:8)
Divine Knowledge:
• Knows people’s thoughts before they speak (Mark 2:8)
• Knows what is in every person (John 2:24–25)
• Foretells Peter’s denial in precise detail
• Foretells Judas’ betrayal before it happens
How do both lists exist in the same person? Because Jesus is both natures, and the Gospels portray Him operating from each nature as the occasion and His sovereign will determined.
After the resurrection, every qualifier seems to lift. He appears to the disciples and says: “All authority in heaven and on earth has been given to me” (Matthew 28:18). Peter looks at the risen Christ and says, simply: “Lord, you know all things” (John 21:17). And in Revelation — written after the exaltation and return to glory — the Father gives revelation to Christ to pass on to His servants. Not because Christ lacks the knowledge independently, but because the distinct roles within the Trinity are still at work even in glory.
“Lord, you know all things; you know that I love you.”
Peter to the risen Christ · John 21:17 · ESV
Peter’s confession says it all. The limitation of the incarnation does not define Jesus permanently. It was real, and it was voluntary, and it was for us.
Two Ways Theologians Have Read This Verse
Across church history, careful readers have offered two main interpretations of Mark 13:32. They are not mutually exclusive, but they emphasize different things.
Interpretation One · Voluntary Human Limitation
This is the most widely held view among orthodox theologians across Catholic, Protestant, and Eastern Orthodox traditions. On this reading, Jesus is speaking from His human nature. As the incarnate Son living within the genuine limits of human experience, He genuinely did not have access to this knowledge in His earthly state.
This aligns perfectly with Luke 2:52, the kenosis passage in Philippians 2, and the broader pattern of Jesus operating within real human limitations throughout the Gospels. It takes both natures of Christ seriously — not explaining away the limitation, but also not using it to deny His deity.
Interpretation Two · “To Know” as “To Reveal”
Some theologians, particularly in the early patristic period, suggested that the word “know” here carries a sense of declaration or disclosure — that Jesus was saying it was not His purpose or role at that time to make known the day or hour, rather than that He literally lacked the information.
This reading has genuine historical precedent, and it rests on a real observation: in Hebrew and Aramaic usage, “to know” can sometimes carry the nuance of acknowledgment or disclosure. However, this interpretation is less widely held today, partly because it can seem to soften what Jesus is actually saying, and partly because the straightforward human-limitation reading is so well supported by the rest of Scripture.
Either way, both interpretations fully preserve the divinity of Christ. This is not a verse that dismantles Christology — it’s a verse that invites us to think more carefully about what the Incarnation actually means.
Does This Create a Problem for the Trinity?
One more objection worth addressing: if the Son doesn’t know something the Father knows, doesn’t that imply the Son is lesser — contradicting the doctrine of the Trinity, which teaches that Father, Son, and Spirit share the same divine nature equally?
The Trinity teaches that the three persons are one God, co-equal in nature, glory, and essence. But the Trinity also involves real distinctions in role and relation. The Father sends; the Son is sent. The Son submits; the Spirit is given. These are not inequalities of being — they are ordered relations of love within the Godhead.
During the Incarnation, the Son voluntarily added a further dimension of submission — taking on real human dependence on the Father as part of genuinely becoming human. This is not a compromise of Trinitarian equality. It is the most dramatic expression of the Son’s eternal disposition of love and deference toward the Father, now lived out in flesh and blood.
Jesus Himself says in John 6:38: “I have come down from heaven, not to do my own will but the will of him who sent me.” This submission is real. And it is freely chosen. And it does not make Jesus less than God any more than a general who defers to the president on a strategic decision is less capable than that president.
Role and nature are different things. The Son’s role in redemption involved willing submission. His nature remains fully divine, always and without diminishment.
Putting It All Together
Mark 13:32 is not a crack in the foundation of Christ’s divinity. It is a window into one of the most breathtaking realities in all of Scripture: the eternal Son of God chose to become genuinely, vulnerably, fully human.
Not human in appearance. Not human as a kind of superhero disguise He could drop whenever it got inconvenient. Actually human — tired, hungry, learning, not-knowing — while simultaneously being the one in whom all the fullness of deity dwells bodily.
That is the Incarnation. It is stranger and more wonderful and more costly than we usually let ourselves imagine. And a verse like Mark 13:32 — rather than embarrassing us — should slow us down and make us marvel at what God was willing to become for our sake.
“The eternal Son did not merely appear human — He truly became human while never ceasing to be God.”
Leave a Reply